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Need to know all of the numbers and conditions to tell how good this offer is. Most of the numbers are in the thread but yes are a bit scattered sorry. 15 Year fixed rate 290k loan value Current rate I get is 3% 2.5% requires $2000 fees 2.625% requires $0 fees The loan amount stays the same meaning...

The monthly payment savings is about $50/month. I ran it through a different calculator found online which takes into account the tax savings and the savings difference over the life of the loan comes out to be $7000.

We are doing it through a local bank where we live. I believe they only handle local refinances but I will check for you guys and post back. They don't publicly advertise rates on their website, I always have to email the broker directly to get a quote. (but you have to pay title, appraisal, etc) Th...

I am asking here on the forums just in case there isn't something I'm missing or that I should check. Running it through some calculators it saves about $12k in interest over the life of the loan. The fee is included in the rate. If he wanted to pay the fee up front, he could probably get 2.5 or 2.3...

Would refinancing a 15 year mortgage from 3% to 2.625% be worth it is there is absolutely no fees and we made catch up payments to ensure the length of the loan stays on the same track as the original one (i.e. paid off within 15 years). This also assumes they do not roll any type of fee into the ne...

I am currently 30 years old and have about 20% of my portfolio in BND (Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF). Does anyone have any thoughts on my current exposure when considering the current low interest rates? I am considering lowering my exposure due to how low rates are (and have been) and the possibi...

If your spouse becomes a stock broker at another firm and you have accounts (only in your name) at another online brokerage are you required to transfer your accounts to the brokerage she was hired at?

also you seem to do what I did: hold every asset class in every account. perhaps theres some simplification you can do Some ETFs are in different accounts but not evenly through every account. This was done for tax purposes. I can only have so much $ in the specific retirement accounts based on the...

Also, now that the new VXUS ETF is available what allocation would be suggested with this being my previous... 50% - VTI - Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF 25% - VEU - Vanguard FTSE All World ex-US Index Inv 15% - BND - Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF 5% - TIPS - iShares Barclays TIPS Bond Fund 5% - V...

Going back to this... I was basing my portfolio off of Ferri's core four which does not mention small cap VSS. But it seems this was immediately recommended here?

If there is no tax cost to switch from VFWIX/VEU to VGTSX, then by all means do so. Yes I guess you are correct since this is in my taxable accounts. In this case I could just go the VSS route. As for TIPS, I would say that anyone paying a mortgage should not invest in TIPS until after their mortga...

This is a personal choice I think. If you want to be able to rebalance between foreign large-cap and foreign small-cap, then I think you will want a separate small-cap foreign fund. I think it is OK to have VEU + VSS or (new_fund) + VSS, but I don't think it is OK to have VEU + (new_fund). Yes sorr...

Not sure I would keep the energy funds. I don't buy sectors. To each their own. Good luck Yes I planned on selling these eventually. I agree with Livesoft. I would add the following Vanguard funds/ETF's: FTSE All world ex-US Small Cap (VSS) Small Cap Value (VISVX) I read here on the forums that van...

Small cap foreign, where is it? You may wish to define what those ticker symbols mean. Thanks, here are the symbols. VTI - Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF VEU - Vanguard FTSE All World ex-US Index Inv BND - Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF TIP - iShares Barclays TIPS Bond Fund VNQ - Vanguard REIT ETF...

Hi, I am just reviewing my current allocation and am wondering if there is any feedback as far as how my accounts look as far as allocation and also if I am missing any tax advantages as far as the investments go between the accounts? When cash is not considered I am basically sticking to this alloc...

Hello, It is a SIMPLE IRA just for clarification. Sales load is right around 5.75%. As far as what to invest in if you do want to invest with AF I am not really seeing the option to invest in anything but AF in this account? I have the option of choosing A, B, C F-1, F-2 shares but it looks like it ...

My wife recently setup an employer sponsored 401k. They match up to 3% of income. Right now her account is set to invest in: Capital World Bond Fund – A - CWBFX EuroPacific Growth Fund – A - AEPGX Washington Mutual Investors Fund – A - AWSHX I notice for every transaction (every pay period) each pur...

When was the last time your boss asked you to work for less money?

It happens all the time? Why do you think the unemployment rate is so high? Because the companies can't afford to pay them.

Last time I checked, salaries were negotiable.

Thanks for the useful answer though.

I apologize if this is the wrong place to ask, or even not an appropriate question for this forum but since it deals with making money out of my investment (my home) maybe it will be fine? What is the latest on negotiating Realtor fees down from 6%? To me whether its a 100k 200k or 300k house the Re...

So basically if you are over the deduct-ability income limits a work-a-round is contributing to a traditional IRA anyway, and then converting it to a roth IRA? Basically a loop hole to contribute to a roth IRA if over the income limit? Kinda a pain :) These are the only accounts we have right now: -...

How is is that you contribute to both an individual 401k and a roth individual 401k? Or are you just saying that the sum of contributions to the two different plan types is $16,500? The S corp contributes as it is a profit sharing plan. I myself contributed 16,500 to roth and the S corp contributes...

I contribute the max to a individual 401k and individual roth 401k. Married filing jointly. We are currently over the income limit to invest in a traditional/roth IRA. My wife has a 401k at her full time job. Is her limit 16,500 or does it also depend on what I contribute to mine? Is there any benef...

Ok thanks.

I ended up finding that etrade lets you create customized portfolios and then use most of their tools to analyze it as needed. I wasn't aware of this until I started digging.

I basically have several accounts so I need a way to plug everything in to get an overall AA view without having to calculate it myself every time. I have search the forums and basically came up with these two options... - MarketRiders - Morningstar Portfolio Manager (free through TD) Are there any ...

Hello,

Yes, savings is sufficient.

I basically meant pay this off or invest it in stocks? 401k/emergency fund/etc is all good to go.

Hi,

- The only other debt I have is about 9k in student loans at 4.5%.

- They state 80% of the LTV requirement on the website for my loan. Of course a new appraisal may shift the payment needed.

Hi,

1. I can not deduct student loan on my tax return due to income limits.
2. Monthly payment: $138.33
3. Loan values below...

Subsidized Consolidation Loan - 4.5% - $6,487.06
Unsub Consolidation Loan - 4.5% - $7,710.41

Should I pay these off or use the money elsewhere?

Thanks!

Ok thanks..

Would Vanguard REIT ETF (VNQ) be better in traditional or roth IRA?

Which should I allocate to in my taxable account first?
* Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (VTI)
* Vanguard FTSE All-World Ex-U.S. ETF (VEU)

It looks like it would be about 25k to remove PMI. We have 130k in retirement savings. 70k personal savings. 130k business savings (single member S corp). We generally max out IRA's each year. I think we could fairly easily pay this from savings? I just wanted to be sure it was not worth it to inves...

- the buyer(s) can't be patient to save before buying We did not want to put down a large down payment due to wanting to keep some savings, so yes, we probably could have waited to save a bit more. Either way, the question concerns what to do now that we have PMI, not what we should have done :) - ...

I have the following loan:
Balance: 292,674.40
Rate: 4.5%
LTV: 87.1% (might be higher due to home devaluation)
Monthly Payment: $2,026.46 ($181.44 is PMI)
Refinanced on 03/09/09 for $302,400.00 loan.

Pay down to get 80% LTV and remove PMI or invest that $?

You may wish to revisit the traditional 401(k) versus the Roth 401(k) threads. You have basically chosen to pay high taxes now and no tax in the future. Ok I'll check them out and do a search. If you have any links to specific ones let me know. I guess I'll erase my assumption that the Roth should ...

How does this work? The limits for 401k contributions are for both types so how do you max out a Roth 401k and still contribute to a regular one? I believe OP is using an Individual 401k that has a Roth account option. I own and file as a single owner of an S Corp. The corporation provides an Indiv...

Hello, Sorry for the confusion. I generally max out my Roth 401k contribution every year. I can no longer contribute to the normal Roth IRA due to income limits. I also contribute to the Individual 401k (about 10k in 2009). Then in the regular taxable account I have a large sum but most of it is in ...

I plan on doing this allocation: * 50% Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (VTI) * 10% Vanguard Emerging Markets ETF (VWO) * 10% Vanguard European Stock (VGK) * 10% Vanguard Pacific Stock (VPL) * 5% Vanguard REIT ETF (VNQ) * 5% iShares Barclays TIPS Bond (TIP) * 10% Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF (BND) ...

keeping track of cost basis if you sell 10 years later would be nightmareish

I believe Etrade does this for you, but may be mistaken.

About...

100k-200k size which the Vanguard fee won't apply.

Looks like they charge $20/year if under 100k in funds for the individual 401k's.

I am not seeing where Vanguard offers the Individual 401k/Roth 401k

EDIT: nevermind found it

You'll make the fee back pretty fast in the ER if you invest a significant amount at once. If you really want to stay with Etrade, just invest once per year. An extra 0.2% isn't the end of the world. Yeah but I was looking to dollar cost average a bit better by investing more frequently. I guess th...

eTrade does offer automatic/no fee investing into these funds:

AROIX - American Century Livestrong
WFQSX - Wells Fargo Advantage DJ Target

But I assume the Vanguard TR funds are recommended over these?

Maybe thats the advantage of splitting up my funds instead of the target date fund? I can't think what I would do in the non-IRA account and still pay attention to overall asset allocation.

Unfortunately I am in the higher tax brackets. I don't have to place it there, I can do the TR in my IRA accounts but I am just wondering where to invest the money in the taxable regular trading account.

Well I guess that poses an issue. I have an old Roth IRA, Individual 401k and Individual Roth 401k with eTrade. So if I am investing in VTIVX in all of these you are suggesting what? Move all of my accounts in order to take advantage on automatic investing?

I have seen where a lot of people do weekly investments into a fund. I have an account with eTrade but to invest in VTIVX target retirement fund there is a $19.95 transaction fee. So if I invest $200 a week or something like that I am automatically losing 10%. Any other way to do this for this fund ...

1) Finding it increasingly harder to rebalance all these funds across multiple IRA/non-IRA accounts and keep them all tax-efficient in the available space in each of the accounts. So you would invest in the TR fund even in a non-IRA account? Most stuff I have read is that the TR funds are not all t...

Most of my investments are in a Roth IRA, Roth 401k and a Individual 401k. If I do a target fund for all three of these accounts what is suggested for the non-tax deferred accounts? I can't really do an overall asset allocation since everything will get lumped into the target fund in the IRA accounts.

Assuming you used Mr. Bogle's rough formula of "Bonds = Age," consider Target Retirement 2020 or 2025. Is there any explanation why these target funds are so far off compared to Mr. Bogle's recommendation of bond %? I assumed 2045 would be the fund to go with but see you mentioned 2025 wh...

Or is there a Core 8 ETF portfolio from Rick or anything?